This is my first entry into the Existential Espresso. The nervousness is high. My defense is to hope that it won't transpose into my writing. Before I begin, I want to thank David, a true hero, and luckily my dear friend for providing this unique opportunity to write for such a great audience. I sincerely hope you will enjoy and learn something from this and further pieces that will, hopefully, come.
While I was thinking of what would suit a decent introduction, an idea that an "enlightenment-inspired" series of texts would supplement the intent of David's benevolent work, imposed itself.
I'm aware that a religious reader might roll their eyes at the theme of enlightenment, as can the true skeptic who knows it to be a movement of an eroded foundation (with many significant achievements, nevertheless). So, I have to dissociate from the historical period and mindset that powered it and underline my only instrumental usage of the term. I believe this is adequate as no other word colors so nicely all the meaning embodied in the process of becoming familiar with the works of those who preceded us, in other words, the process of understanding civilization.
So, I shall start with the very first precondition for enlightenment - civilization.
Civilization is one of those subjects that seem self-explanatory and familiar when thought about briefly but are followed by a reflection that they hold much more meaning than we realize. This meaning unravels through the intellectual exploration of this great companion of time and people.
One of the biggest mysteries and phenomena of human development is how what we create - creates us. Civilization is a perfect example. It is completely man-made by both deliberate and spontaneous means and nevertheless determines our lives in many conceivable and inconceivable ways. Also, civilization has a quality that it cannot be built from scratch by a blueprint. If we were to be so stupid as to destroy most of our world today, but somehow live to see the next day, it would be only to wake up to a bloodcurdling realization that what we know of - cannot be rebuilt. A distinct attribute of civilization is that it resides outside of us, and even if the most knowledgeable and intelligent were to survive, they would still be desperate. Their specialized knowledge, once so pressured to be up to date, would suddenly be premature. With advanced or even basic technologies lost much of what we know would be useless. Humankind would have to rely on very rudimentary tools and abilities. In this scenario, we wouldn't reserve our energy and focus for remembering and rebuilding what once was. It is much more probable that we would regress in a few generations to the lows of primitive psychology. Tribes fighting each other over food or land is what one would encounter, not a group of democratic individuals parliamentary discussing what was written in Shakespeare's Hamlet. This in itself serves as a great testament to what we have achieved and underlines the fundamental importance of civilization, as well as its uniqueness deriving from the spontaneous nature of accumulated efforts. Rome wasn't built in a day. Civilization wasn't built in centuries, let alone years. It took millennia to get where we are.
Renowned erudite Will Durant who wrote his monumental The Story of Civilization provided a rather elegant definition of civilization as "a social order that promotes cultural creation." The first part, "a social order" captures the essential feature of civilization. There is no civilization without order. Not just any kind of order, as found in various animal species, but social order, meaning humanly organized order (by way of rules). The birth of the social order is the dawn of civilization. This is undisputed. The second part of the definition is debatable, especially nowadays. The promotion of "cultural creation" through civilization can be historically traced, but the argument for the opposite - disabling it, seems plausible too. "Cultural creation" can lead to new ideas, which can be revolutionary. Revolutionary ideas in the political domain can attain a goal highly undesirable for order maintenance. It is logical for social order to try to repress them, as they aim to overthrow it. Overthrowing the current order either by radical or proactive means can lead to the inauguration of a better one (after a while, of course.) The American and French revolutions are great examples. It goes to show that the concept of civilization needs both social order and culture to be displayed properly. We have to account for both if we ought to preserve the integrity of the concept, which provides its highest utility - the vision of the common good for mankind.
Today, civilization is mainly understood as distinct from culture, which I find unjust. The modern usage of the term civilization has been reduced to mostly technological and societal aspects, while once, culture and civilization were synonymous. A civilization without culture is just a shell. I can grasp the theoretical division but cannot conform to it. Every technological innovation and scientific progress occur in a specific cultural context, which creates motives, goals, and wanted outcomes and generally enables an environment that facilitates or discourages scientific action. I will save the topics of culture versus civilization and the "dark side" of civilization for the future. Diving into this digression further would defeat the purpose of an introduction.
Civilization is a story of creation and destruction, the outcome of the cumulative effect of all the efforts that preceded its given state. To prove this, let's use an example of demographics and population. Civilization, in the context of politics and especially geopolitics, is marked by countries and their power. One of the crucial determinants of a powerful nation is its population size. All current superpowers are populous countries, and those who are or were knocking on that door are large in this sense. Not only that, population trends can directly influence the outcome of this race. If they are negative, aspiring power cannot count on the positive outcome, and vice-versa. It turns out that the decision to have on, two, three, or no children doesn't concern only you, even though it is the most personal decision by definition. Also, if a country goes through a substantial struggle and has a steep decline in newborns it will have a long-lasting effect on its demographic potential because when that generation grows up to childbearing age - it will be too small to "produce" enough babies so that population can grow, even possibly entering a long-term downward spiral. This can lead to a significant diminishing and will affect the country's policies (Because all powers strive to sustain or overthrow).
No matter what is your ideological view or if you have any at all, the ongoing power struggle between the two powers of your time will affect you in some way. If Hitler's coalition had won, we would live in a different world today. If you don't prefer the blatant Hitler example, like me, let's revert to population and domestic non-coercive policies. A country facing a population problem can decide to introduce stimulative measures for young couples to have more children. Maybe, because of the strong government support, you'll find it easier to raise children and end up having three instead of one. Three children and one child are vastly different lives. Perhaps the government goes a different route, softens the immigration laws, and allows for easier obtaining of working permits, residence, or citizenship. Such measures can cause a massive influx of various people, changing the cultural landscape forever. Such outcomes are known to many countries.
Admiring civilization requires both intellectual and emotional maturity. When the rebellion ghosts which vehemently rule our young age pass, we can finally see how not all is bad and that a formidable endeavor is to criticize the old and even more challenging - to propose a replacement for something that already is. Yet, to enrich civilization, one has to overcome this fact.
Getting to know civilization is to grasp the foundations beneath how we live. The goal is to determine and comprehend the essential ideas, facts, and products. To do so, one first must become aware of the key phenomena that constitute our societies. We have accustomed to many of these marvels: laws, courts, money, trade, households, firms, ownership, property, countries, armies, and especially language. As soon as we immerse in any of the named fields, we begin to realize the innumerable layers of knowledge underneath. If you are a curious person, enlightening yourself with it is one of the most satisfying goals you can envision.
Of course, hardly anyone becomes familiar with all the components comprising it. Nevertheless, a life-long strive to encompass in one's understanding as much of its substance is to embark on a journey of achieving wisdom. The more you search, learn, and dwell on this matter, the more you can expect from it. It's false to think that only an academician can set himself up for such a task or that superior intelligence is needed to comprehend such a diverse and profound matter. And no, you do not need to have read ten tomes of the history of France (for example) or to be able to pinpoint the date of any random but important historical event to consider yourself worthy of having a conversation about civilization. As you know, no one was born knowledgeable, and to read just a fraction of everything there is, and there is very much, is a great achievement. I do not find it necessary to cite any statistics here, as I fully believe you can see in your daily contacts how many people have read a single piece of work from this body. There are even fewer of those who glow with the passion that I'm trying to ignite in you with these lines. To bring this to a concrete end - Don't be desperate for knowing you will never read all of Shakespeare, get used to all the ideas of Plato, Thoreau, or Nietzsche, learn to enjoy the divine sounds of Vivaldi or Rachmaninoff or talk extensively about psychological motives in Dostoyevsky's novels or Tolstoy's unmatched mastery. You can be casual about it, and still provide your mind with enough of the nuts and bolts necessary for any serious thinking. If you find that it suits you well - I envy you!
Milićević Nenad
*I have learned this half-done English in school where they taught us the British original, but I've spoken it in the US mainly, so I opt to write the z instead of s, even though I may not be consistent with the American variant in other instances. (Despite the help of overpowered AI grammar check assistance, it is healthy to be slightly stubborn with these new technologies :) Please, ignore it.
great piece, excited to read more from you
Really made me think about the state of America once again with the current demographic decline. Was expecting another essay about self development and other ideas, but this was a different topic than usual and I enjoyed it.